Notes of a Red Guard

by Eduard M. Dune, Diane P. Koenker (Editor), S.A. Smith (Translator)

This compelling never-before-published
  account takes the reader into Red Guard and Red Army units, Moscow factories,
  workers' homes, and to the unfamiliar world of feudal Dagestan. Worker-revolutionary
  Eduard Dune was seventeen when the Russian revolution began. He joined the Bolshevik
  party and fought with the Moscow Red Guard during the October revolution. Notes
  of a Red Guard is his candid account of what happened through 1921. This
  uncensored account offers a rare glimpse of revolutionary Russia from the perspective
  of an educated, skilled worker who became a rank-and-file participant.
 

Genres: History, Biography, Russian History, Russian Revolution, Nonfiction

328 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1993

Reviews

[Callie M · Rating 4 out of 5]

From a 17 year old rubber factory worker to a soldier in the red army - what an incredible account of the Russian revolution and civil war! I haven't read any other "rank and file" Bolshevik memoirs, but this was incredible. Well worth a read!

[Roan Byrne-Sarno · Rating 5 out of 5]

Notes of a Red Guard is an autobiographical work written by Eduard Dune. We follow him from his young adulthood to his service as a member of the Red Guard to the end of the Russian Civil War. The book offers an interesting first-hand account of the Russian Revolution and the conditions that created it. The language is by no means easy, but it isn’t too difficult either. The book gives you a very personal view into the civil war and it doesn’t try to hide the harsh conditions that soldiers and civilians on both sides faced. What is most interesting about this book is the position that Dune is in when he writes it. By the time he wrote the book, he was exiled from the soviet union for pro-Trotskyist sentiment. His life story does a good job of representing the life story of the soviet union. It was a truly revolutionary movement that was forced by material need to become anti-revolutionary. Overall Notes of a Red Guard was fairly enjoyable and very studiable so I would recommend it.

[Nicholas · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you ever wanted to read the perspective of a worker and later communist officer at the outbreak of the Russian Revolution and the Russian Civil War, this is the work for you. Dune gives an interesting picture of the state of Russia from 1917 to 1919.

[Tyler Amick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent account of the Russian Revolution and its aftermath with commentary placing the memoir in historical context

[Alexandra Forsenate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Honestly, I don’t think I would’ve finished it if it hadn’t been compulsory. In the first half of the book, Dune completely evades every thing that would be interesting about a first-hand account of the Russian Civil War, chiefly the actual first-hand account. I understand that that is sometimes a stylistic choice, but that being said, there’s only so much I can take of every other sentence being this army traveled here, and this army that was named this went there. It was shaping up to be a one star book, but around halfway Dune finds his voice. He writes about personal experiences and tells the story from his unique perspective as prisoner. In my opinion, this is more valuable historically speaking than the observational work in the first half. He found his flow and the book was genuinely compelling. The book finished rather abruptly, but he makes interesting assertions in his conclusion. I don’t want to be too harsh, because the book is genuinely solid and well written for what it is: a political and historical military autobiography. That being said, it wasn’t my favorite.

[isabella]

holy shit i’m done i’m free

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

I originally read this in a Russian history class years ago, but wanted to read it again. This book provides with an excellent insight into the Russian revolution from the perspective of a worker that goes on to fight in the Red Guard and then the Red Army. Dune shows the enthusiasm at the start and then slowly becomes skeptical of the direction the party was heading towards by the end.

[Lettie Laferriere · Rating 4 out of 5]

Required reading for my research seminar on the Russian Revolution at WSU.